This collection encompasses 50-plus years of interviews, readings, speeches, and reports on the vibrant literary scene in Minnesota. Not only home to giants F. Scott Fitzgerald and Sinclair Lewis, our state has an array of incredible contemporary poets, novelists, and playwrights. Their words make up majority of this collection.
Repeatedly being named the “Most Literate City in the United States,” the Twin Cities has played host to numerous visiting national writers via book tours, festivals, and lectures. Many recordings of these are also included.
This project was funded by the National Historical Publications & Records Commission.
February 22, 2000 - At the start of his new book, conservative onlooker David Frum assesses life in America in the year 2000. We are richer than ever before, he says, there are more jobs, and great social advancements. But it's a mistake, he says, to think the turbulent 1960s laid the entire foundation for the improvements we enjoy today. Frum is a regular contributor to The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Morning Edition, and his new book is called "How We Got Here: The Seventies the Decade that Brought You Modern Life, for Better or Worse".
February 28, 2000 - The February edition of Voices of Minnesota highlights the work of two African American women. MPR’s Stephanie Curtis interviews Mary Easter, Northfield dancer and choreographer, who discusses the political nature of her work. MPR’s Dan Olson interviews Dr. Geneva Southall, author and retired University of Minnesota Afro-American Studies history professor, who talks about her personal reflections on race, and her research on "Blind Tom" (Thomas Green Wiggins).
February 28, 2000 - Minneapolis resident Dr. Geneva Southall has written two volumes of history about the life and times of Blind Tom, a black composer. Dr. Southall is a professor emeritus of Afro-American Studies at the University of Minnesota. She talked with Minnesota Public Radio's Dan Olson about the slave who was a composer as part of our Voices of Minnesota interview series.
March 2, 2000 - A twin cities speech by author Studs Terkel. Studs spoke at Macalester College recently. His most recent book is The Spectator.
March 13, 2000 - Even as a pre-schooler growing up in Baudette, Minnesota, Christin Lore Weber knew she wanted to become a nun. At the age of 17, she entered the convent, and spent the next 14 years of her life there. Ultimately, she left the Church to marry and fulfill her dream of becoming a writer.
March 16, 2000 - Minnesota prison inmates have written and illustrated a book which they hope will keep at-risk kids from becoming fellow inmates.
March 24, 2000 - A Macalester College speech by Marketplace host David Brancaccio, about his new book, Squandering Aimlessly: My Adventures in the American Marketplace.
March 29, 2000 - Star Tribune writer and Minnesota Public Radio sports analyst Jay Weiner will be in the MPR studios to talk about his new book, Stadium Games: Fifty Years of Big League Greed and Bush League Boondoggle
March 30, 2000 - Three years ago, creative writing teacher and children's author Jane Kurtz found herself a refugee. The Grand Forks resident was one of the many who lost their homes and neighborhoods in the Red River Flood of 1997. Kurtz said she didn't write about the experience right away, because it was too raw and too close. But as time went by, she collected her poems into a book for children called River Friendly, River Wild. It's dedicated to everyone who survived the flood, or helped its victims, and anyone anywhere who has had to pick up life after a natural disaster. I asked her about her most vivid memory of the flood.
April 1, 2000 - American culture has shaped powerful myths about the war - and some of the most powerful ones surround the Vietnam-era veteran. This American RadioWorks documentary, “Revisiting Vietnam: 25 Years From Vietnam,” presents various reports and interviews from an American perspective.